


Unexpected Dinner Guests

by bowsofwrath



Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal Lecter Series - All Media Types
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Ghosts, Psychic Will Graham, minor gore, season 1 AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-04
Updated: 2017-06-04
Packaged: 2018-11-09 01:27:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11094027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bowsofwrath/pseuds/bowsofwrath
Summary: The way Will said Hannibal’s name was worrying.  It was the sort of tone used when someone was going to point out a major character flaw and suggest ways to fix it, or ask to borrow a large amount of money.





	Unexpected Dinner Guests

“Hannibal?”

Will was sitting in Hannibal’s dining room. He and the doctor were lingering after dinner. Typically Hannibal would have cleared the table by now and started washing dishes. For some reason Will was exceptionally chatty this evening.

The way Will said Hannibal’s name was worrying. It was the sort of tone used when someone was going to point out a major character flaw and suggest ways to fix it, or ask to borrow a large amount of money.

“I don’t know if you will believe me. I’m pretty sure you won’t. I get that. I really do. I wouldn’t believe me either.” Will started. “I need you to understand that what I am about to say is the truth. I would not lie to you. Not about something this serious.”

Looks like tonight’s conversation was going to take the major character flaw route. “I believe you will be honest, Will” Hannibal said. 

Will took a sip from his wine. His hands were trembling. He had been doing that lately. Hannibal had thought it had to do with his headaches. Will placed the glass back on the table and stood up slightly so he could maneuver his chair so he was directly facing Hannibal.

Will rubbed his hands together and began to speak. “I’m sure you have heard from Jack or whoever that I make jumps that I can’t explain. That’s what makes me such an effective profiler. That’s not the truth. I can explain the jumps I make. The information comes from the victims. Not from their bodies or their profiles but from what they tell me. Hannibal, I can see and speak to the dead.”

A lot of things had been confessed to Hannibal over the years. It comes with the territory of being a doctor and even more so when you become a psychiatrist. Will was not the first one to ever tell him they had psychic abilities. It was the first time someone he considered a friend told him. 

Hannibal kept his expression neutral. Will looked at him expectantly. It was obvious to Hannibal that somehow Will had gotten this far in life without being properly diagnosed and treated for his mental illness, at least the mental illnesses he wasn’t already aware of. It was sad really. 

“You are awfully quite” Will said. His nervousness was palpable. 

“My silence concerns you” Hannibal asked?

“Yes!” Will ran his hands through his hair in effort to calm himself down. “This is some serious, deepest darkest secret type stuff here Hannibal. I have never told anyone about my abilities. I’m already crazy. I don’t want people to think I am insane.”

“When do you see these” Hannibal paused to pick the right word “spirits?”

“Almost every day” Will got up and began pacing next to the table. “As far back as I can remember.”

“You both see and hear them” Hannibal asked?

“You don’t believe me.” It was not a question but a statement.

Hannibal sat back in his chair. “I believe that you are telling me the truth. I believe that you are experiencing these things. I also believe that you may have more than an empathy disorder.”

“I’m not making it up.”

“No, you aren’t. You see and hear things and your mind has grasped for an explanation. The explanation you grasped on to is that you are seeing and hearing the dead. It may be that it is easier for you to believe in the impossible than to acknowledge a deeper problem.”

Will paced faster. “I have deep problems. I’m talking Marianas Trench deep problems. I am not trying to delude myself.”

“Not intentionally, especially if you have been experiencing these hallucinations from a very early age. A young boy would be more open to magical thinking than a grown man” Hannibal said.

Will continued to pace becoming more agitated by the moment. He returned to his seat as suddenly as he had gotten up. “I need your help Hannibal. I don’t know what you are going to say to this.”

“I’ll help you any way I can” Hannibal said. 

“Everyone has some shades, nondescript echoes of…” Will paused obviously trying to pick his next words carefully. “Sometimes when someone…” Will stopped again obviously becoming frustrated. He was having such a problem articulating these particular thoughts. He had never discussed this before making the whole situation more difficult.

“Everyone has spirits around them. I can ignore them. They don’t want anything to do with me. I don’t want anything to do with them. I don’t even know if ninety percent of them even know I can see them. They aren’t stuck here in…” Wil gestured around them to indicate the world they all inhabited on a daily basis.

Hannibal got up and put a hand on Will’s shoulder. “How about you sit down, try and calm yourself and I’ll make some coffee” Hannibal asked the frazzled FBI agent? Will nodded relieved to momentarily be given a break from the conversation he started.

The coffee maker hissed as it always did. Hannibal added sugar to the coffee cups he had retrieved from the cabinet. It was a shame really. Hannibal thought letting Will’s encephalitis continue would make the man more pliable, easier to mold to view the world as he did. It looked like he had miscalculated and left Will on the heat too long. Now his brain was over cooked. 

As he was contemplating the state of the most broken pony in Jack’s stable and whether or not it would be more humane to put the old boy down than let him suffer, he had become quite fond of Will, the other man joined him in the kitchen. Hannibal handed Will his coffee.

Will took a sip. His color was a little better than it had been for the past few days. Hannibal also thought he didn’t look as fevered as he had previously. Perhaps Will wasn’t a lost cause just yet. There might be something to this. Something Hannibal could work to his advantage.

“When I see victims they are lost and confused. I have to get their attention somehow and ask them what happened. They typically don’t know. I still have to work through the details but with the input they give me I can make the pieces fall into place much faster.”

“Are you Russian” Will asked abruptly? “I don’t mean in a distant ancestor sort of way, but is that where you come from originally?”

Hannibal stopped with his coffee cup half way to his mouth. “No.” Most people asked Hannibal about his ethnicity. He never gave much of an answer to the question though. He would admit to living in France and Italy. Anything else he didn’t want to think about, too many bad memories.

Will shrugged “she sounds Russian to me.”

“Who” Hannibal asked?

“The little girl who is always with you.”

Will grabbed Hannibal’s coffee cup before it slipped out of his grasp. He placed both cups on the counter. Hannibal was stunned silent. He stared at Will. ‘No, he can’t know. No one knows’ Hannibal thought.

“She looks between four and six-ish maybe. I’m not sure. Her hair is a dirty blonde. I can’t tell what color her eyes are. When I try to look at her she clings to your leg or hides behind you. I can’t talk to her. I’m pretty sure she doesn’t speak English. I don’t know any other languages.”

Hannibal began walking away from Will back into the dining room. His mind was spinning. Obviously Will was trying to play some sort of cruel joke on him. That had to be the reason. Somehow he had looked into his past and found out about his family. Perhaps he realized the manipulation and had tried to get back at him. Thought he could pull Hannibal’s strings with stories about Mischa.

Will must be getting some sort of treatment for his encephalitis and that’s why he didn’t look as fevered today as he had. Well, he wasn’t going to get away with it. Hannibal began to think of other ways to kill Will that had nothing to do with putting him out of his misery.

Will just stood and watched Hannibal stare into his fireplace. His face was as impassive as always but Will knew he had struck a chord with the doctor. As he waited he began to watch the timid little girl he began to notice when Hannibal accompany Abigail in the ambulance.

She wore a light color dress that was filthy as she was. Over time he was able to see more detail of the specter. There was dirt embedded under her finger nails, bruises on the exposed skin her legs and arms. Her toes were black with more frostbite than dirt. 

Will could see splits in the skin on the soles of her feet and where infection had obviously set in. He wanted to be able to talk to her. She was breaking his heart. ‘I wish you could understand me’ he thought. ‘I don’t want you to be in pain anymore.’ Other spirits could hear his thoughts but she gave no indication that she could. It was frustrating. 

Most of the time she seemed distracted as if watching and observing Hannibal’s behavior. There were a few times she ran in circles around the chairs in Hannibal’s office or the island of his kitchen. Will couldn’t see her face when she did. She moved too quickly. He could hear her chatter to herself but he couldn’t make out the words.

Now she stood still as if she hoped no one would notice her. The little girl radiated fear. She wrapped her arms around her torso and shook slightly. She began to whimper. ‘It’s alright’ Will thought. He had seen the behavior in strays before, but why was she acting like she was expecting Hannibal to become violent?

Will had wanted to find out if Hannibal knew who she was and could tell him the language she spoke. Maybe if he could be really persuasive he would be able to get Hannibal to tell her to go. Whoever she was it was obvious she was suffering. As Will waited for Hannibal to compose himself something really surprising happened. The little girl finally turned around.

Hannibal was aware of Will watching him. As far as Hannibal was concerned Will could stand there all night. He was half expecting, half hoping Will would just leave. Then Hannibal could begin preparations to dispatch Will and be out of Baltimore by the end of the week. He could go back to Italy and hide out for a while.

There was a thud from behind Hannibal that broke him out of his planning. He turned to see Will on the floor staring just to Hannibal’s right trying to scurry away backwards looking very much like he had seen a ghost. ‘Bravo Will’ Hannibal thought. Before Hannibal had a chance to ask what Will was trying to do now, he spoke.

“Fucking Christ, Hannibal! What happened to her teeth?”

The words struck Hannibal like a sledge hammer. There was no possible way Will could have known what happened to Mischa’s teeth. Hannibal didn’t know himself. He had always assumed when he saw her baby teeth in stool pit all those frozen years ago that they had fallen out during the cooking process.

There was not much left of Mischa’s body for the local authorities to make an accurate report of how she died. Hannibal had been questioned for hours by police and other assorted officials, but didn’t utter a word the entire time. This was impossible.

“Enough” Hannibal cried! Whether he was talking to Will, himself or the shadow of a little girl he wasn’t sure. His human veil was slipping. The person suit was tearing at the seams and whatever lurked behind was the closest to being released it had been since Hannibal had killed those responsible for Mischa’s death.

There was a blur of motion. Suddenly there was a vice like grip on his upper arm and Will was dragged across the floor toward the kitchen. The little girl began screaming. The sound echoing in Will’s head as if she was screaming in his ears, inside his skull. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t react. If he opened his eyes all he could see was her face, mouth open and gums bleeding down the front of her dress.

Will didn’t notice the hatch in the pantry floor but he did notice the stairs he had been thrown down. His head bounced off the concrete floor at the bottom and then he didn’t notice anything else.  
Hannibal stood at the top of the basement stairs shaking with rage. With the person suite now gone it was the monster that descended on the form of the unconscious FBI agent.


End file.
